[Air-L] CFP: Distribution Matters ICA 2017 Pre-Conference

[Joshua Braun]

With apologies for cross-posting! —Josh


Distribution Matters // Media Circulation in Civic Life and Popular Culture

ICA PRECONFERENCE CALL
May 25, 2017 in San Diego

[This call is on the web at https://distributionmatters.wordpress.com]

This preconference aims to examine how and why media distribution matters to
civic life and media culture and the ways in which it underpins issues that
are more traditionally examined in terms of media production or textual
analysis. After all, many of the biggest challenges and opportunities facing
the media industries today revolve around the capacity to circulate media and
information instantaneously and more cheaply than ever before via the
internet—what Michael Curtin, Jennifer Holt, and Kevin Sanson (2014) have
referred to as the "distribution revolution."

At the same time, grappling with the signal importance of media distribution
in industry and public life also means understanding that this importance is
older than, and reaches beyond, today's commercial internet. Scholars from
across the field of media industry research—and in other areas including media
law and regulation, communication history, journalism studies, and cultural
theory—have used a variety of analytical vocabularies to theorize the
distribution process. Historian and social theorist Michael Warner (2002), for
instance, offers examples from the 17th century press when he argues that
distribution is the central concern in the construction of democratic publics.
"Not texts themselves create publics, but the concatenation of texts through
time," he writes. "Only when a previously existing discourse can be supposed,
and when a responding discourse can be postulated, can a text address a
public" (p. 90). In other words, reliable distribution networks make possible
the individual and collective conceit that when we publish a text we are
speaking to the same assembled group over time.

Media distribution, then, can be read as the infrastructural heart of
"imagined communities" in the style of Benedict Anderson (2006). If, as
Charles Acland (2003) argues, "the organization of how, when, and under what
conditions people congregate is a fundamental dimension of social life," it is
through distribution practices and infrastructures that much of this
organization takes place (Tryon, 2013), both historically and in today's media
environment.

CALL FOR ABSTRACTS

We aim to bring together the growing group of scholars who focus on
distribution as its own topic of study, as well as other work that intersects
with distribution, but has not typically been framed in that way—topics such
as internet governance, trending algorithms, digital rights management, media
infrastructures, and others.

Participants should submit an extended abstract of one to two pages. Accepted
abstracts will be developed into papers to be distributed to panelists and
other attendees in advance of the event. Abstracts may take the form of brief
case studies, position papers, conceptual interventions, or other formats
likely to lead to engaged discussion. Rather than lengthy research
presentations, participants will present briefly (5 minutes) on their work
before participating in a roundtable discussion.

Submissions dealing with both contemporary and historical themes and subjects
are welcomed, as are submissions from a wide variety of disciplinary
approaches. Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:

* Distribution and Imagined Community. How do contemporary, legacy, and
historical distribution infrastructures, practices, and policies affect the
construction of publics and our sense of community? Whether it's a nation's
postal network, the broadcast radius of the local television station, the
circulation footprint of the local newspaper, the far-flung reach of satellite
television channels, or the "calculated publics" (e.g., Gillespie, 2014)
produced by algorithms on contemporary online media platforms, we welcome
explorations of the ways in which distribution brings together—or
divides—publics and public discourses.

* Distribution and Media Work. Can a focus on distribution broaden
traditionally production-focused accounts of labor in the media industries,
whether by considering distribution as an important form of labor unto itself
or by exploring the impact of distribution on production work? We welcome
accounts that examine what it takes to get content in front of audiences, and
the various kinds of labour involved—from PR and marketing work to
warehousing, shelf-stacking and transportation.

* Distribution and Public Discourse. Much has been said—and debated—about the
manner in which digital technologies have allowed ordinary people to
distribute their own content, as well as the manner in which a few large
online intermediaries have come to dominate revenues and the market for
audiences' attention. Digital distribution platforms (and some of their
historical predecessors) also present us with a high-choice media environment
characterized by filter bubbles and fragmentation. Where do these debates
about disintermediation and fragmentation stand today? And what does it mean
to examine them in terms of distribution?

* Distribution, Public Visibility, and Surveillance. The infrastructures of
distribution—the presence of papers on news racks or channels on the dial—have
long served to make the audiences for particular media visible to a broader
public, as well as to interpellate prospective members of those
audiences/publics. At the same time, distribution infrastructures also offer
tremendous affordances for surveillance—rifling the mail, intercepting
telegraph signals, tapping phones, placing digital cookies, deep packet
inspection. We welcome contributions that examine distribution as a tool of
visibility and/or consider its role in the business and politics of seeing and
being seen.

* Distribution, Popular Culture, and Personalization. Digital media is
characterized by the contrasting dynamics of increased sociability (through
apps, social media and 'sharing') and increased individualization (through
mobile viewing, miniature screens, and personalized recommendations). By some
accounts, media use has shifted from being a communal, in-person experience in
theaters and living rooms to a rather more individual and personalized one,
enjoyed by each user on her own personal device. We welcome contributions that
examine the changing scale of media experiences through various distribution
technologies.

* Distribution and Intellectual Property. The one-click model of friction-free
digital distribution is still a work in progress. Content providers, streaming
services, and digital storefronts jockey for position in ways that have
resulted in fragmentation, incompatible standards, and copy protection schemes
that alter consumers' relationships with their media and devices.
Unsurprisingly then, unauthorized distribution (i.e., piracy) remains a
constant feature of everyday media consumption in all countries. We welcome
contributions examining the relationship between distribution, IP, and
consumption.

* Affordances of Distribution, Past and Present. Digital distribution
infrastructures include a tremendous number of high-tech affordances for
selectively placing content in front of audiences—filters, recommender
systems, geolocation/geoblocking, and metadata-based categorization to name
just a few. What role do these affordances (and their associated constraints)
play in contemporary media distribution and its social impacts? And what
historical precedents exist for what we typically think of as uniquely digital
phenomena?

FORMAT

Panelists whose abstracts are accepted will develop them into papers that will
be distributed in May to preconference attendees in advance of the event.
Participants will introduce, then discuss their papers with other scholars in
a series of thematically organized roundtables, with the conversation
moderated by a panel chair who participates in the conversation.

Roundtables will be held in front of the full audience of preconference
attendees; after the initial moderated discussion the floor will be opened to
audience questions. The final panel of the preconference will be a reflection
by senior scholars on the work and themes of the day.

The organizers hope to work with participants following the event to develop a
selection of the conference abstracts into papers for a special issue or
edited volume.

SUBMISSION PROCESS

Please email submissions to <distribution.matters.preconf at gmail.com> by
November 20, 2016. Authors will be informed of acceptance/rejection decisions
no later than December 20, 2016. Accepted abstracts will be posted to the
preconference website in advance of the event.

If you have questions about submissions or any aspect of the preconference,
you may direct them to <distribution.matters.preconf at gmail.com> or  contact
any of the individual organizers—Joshua Braun <jabraun at umass dot edu>, Ramon
Lobato <ramonlobato at gmail dot com>, or Amanda Lotz <lotz at umich dot edu>.

LOCATION AND REGISTRATION

The preconference will be held at San Diego State University's Conrad Prebys
Aztec Student Union (6075 Aztec Cir Dr.), which is located directly on the San
Diego trolley system's Green Line, making it reachable from the conference
hotel for just $5 round-trip. For faster door-to-door service, participants
can split cab fares to and from the event. More details on transport to and
from the event will be provided at a later date.

Registration will be limited to 60 persons via a registration code to be
issued by the organizers. After accepted presenters have registered,
registration will be open to any ICA attendee who requests a code until the
cap of 60 is reached or administrative deadlines force us to finalize event
attendance. Thanks to the generosity of our sponsors, we do not anticipate a
registration fee.

CONFIRMED PARTICIPANTS

Sandra Ball-Rokeach, ICA Fellow, Professor in the Annenberg School for
Communication and Journalism at the University of Southern California,
director of the USC Communication Technology and Community Program

Sandra Braman, ICA Fellow, John Paul Abbott Professor of Liberal Arts and
Professor of Communication at Texas A&M University.

Stuart Cunningham, Distinguished Professor of Media and Communications,
Digital Media Research Centre, Queensland University of Technology

Greg Downey, Evjue-Bascom Professor in the School of Journalism and Mass
Communication and the School of Library and Information Studies at the
University of Wisconsin-Madison

Sharon Strover, Philip G. Warner Regents Professor in Communication, director
of the Technology and Information Policy Institute at UT Austin

SPECIAL THANKS

This preconference is possible thanks to the ICA Media Industry Studies
Interest Group and the ICA Journalism Studies and Popular Communication
Divisions.

We are especially grateful for financial support from the Media Industry
Studies Interest Group; the University of Michigan Department of Communication
Studies; the University of Massachusetts Amherst Journalism Department and
College of Social and Behavioral Sciences; and the Culture Digitally
scholarship collective. It is thanks to their generous support that we have
been able to make this event free to participants.


-- 
Josh Braun, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Journalism Studies
Journalism Department
University of Massachusetts Amherst

@josh_braun
Skype: wideaperture
http://wideaperture.net/
new book: http://yalebooks.com/book/9780300197501/program-brought-you

"Maybe the only gift is a chance to inquire, to know nothing for certain. An inheritance of wonder and nothing more."
William Least Heat-Moon